A Final Thank You

I would like to wish every one of my colleagues the best on their continuing journey with Walden and beyond. I have truly enjoyed getting to know so many dedicated professionals since starting this journey in 2008 with my Bachelor's degree. I look forward to meeting many of you at graduation and I hope we keep in touch after we are finally finished!
Again-Best to everyone in your future endeavors!!

Week 6

·         Blog Assignment: Week 6<p>

This week you read about the five stages of team development: forming, storming, norming, performing, and adjourning. Consider the adjourning phase for several of the groups in which you have been involved. Think about which aspects of the groups made for the hardest good-bye. Are high-performing groups hardest to leave? Groups with the clearest established norms? Which of the groups that you participated in was hardest to leave? Why? What sorts of closing rituals have you experienced or wish you had experienced? How do you imagine that you will adjourn from the group of colleagues you have formed while working on your master's degree in this program? Why is adjourning an essential stage of teamwork? <p>

 

After reading about the five stages of team development this week, I do think that high-performing groups would be the hardest to leave. I say this because when you think about this type of group, it would be a group where the people in most cases have become close and very similar to how a family works together. When I worked for the county as a SACC teacher, I was part of a five person team that I thought was working great together-but all good things must come to an end. I found out that one of the head teachers was taking credit for what the rest of were doing and making it look like she was the only one working, therefore we ended up in a very uncomfortable situation that became too much to handle and three of us decided to make formal complaints and then leave. This was still very hard to leave since we had been working as a cohesive team. This type would probably be hard to leave also because it seems that everyone is pulling their part and have realized how important each member is to the team. So far I think my SACC team was the hardest to leave because of the friendships build and what I thought was a great set of team members that shared ideas and resources. I wish that we had been able to get together away from the worksite and just relax and talk about how much we had learned from each other when it was time to leave. <p>

 

When it comes time to adjourn from the colleagues that I have worked with in at least one class since starting at Walden (received my Bachelors in October 2012) and then continuing on with my Masters degree that we will finish this year, I will say it’s going to be very hard to say good-bye. I have learned so much from everyone and maintained a solid routine over the years by asking what works for others and trying it out for my own use. I am really hoping that I will be able to keep in touch with at least some of my colleagues to see how our goals work out after this part of the learning is done. I know that I will always have questions and hope my new friends will still help me to learn as we continue to grow outside of the classroom/online community. Routines are important and so is closure in all parts of our interactions with others. <p>

Conflicts and Communicating

Blog Week 5<p>

This week we are talking about conflicts and how to work through them without anyone getting hurt or in general how we are dealing with the situation. The conflict that is affecting me and my family currently has to do with my granddaughter’s school. My granddaughter started kindergarten this September and there have been issues from the beginning with not only the teacher, but the principle also. My granddaughter will be six in June, so this makes her the youngest in her old class and new one, the problems started when she was placed in a chair at circle time (because she talks to others), not allowed to have recess most days and not allowed to eat or finish her lunch. Both teachers are telling us she is spitting on children (something she has never done), she is also messing with her classmates papers in some way, we are not saying she is perfect-but the school is telling us that she is misbehaving EVERYDAY! My daughter and I have had meetings with not only the teachers, but the principle and they tell us that she is doing better one day and then horrible the next. The principle has also been caught lying to us about what she said she was going to do with my granddaughter. She told us she was going to take care of the teacher that was labeling my granddaughter as a trouble child and did not. What we are seeing is the school protecting the own and not putting the children’s safety and well-being first (we have talked with other parents with the same type of problems with this school). <p>

I guess what I am trying to say is we have tried to work with the school and stay calm, but no matter what type of strategy we go in with-it doesn’t work. We have tried to be cooperative with the school, but as I said, they say something and do another. We thought after moving her to another kindergarten class thing would be better, but after one week, the emails and bad cards started coming home. My granddaughter is at the point where she does not want to go to school at all! We are educators here-any suggestions would be greatly appreciated as to how we work with this school and get her back to enjoying her learning experience. She is also experiencing bulling from the children that are in both her classes (present and old), most of the children in her classes are 7 or almost seven-to me this is too old to be in kindergarten! Is this the new norm? To keep your child out of school until they are this old? We are running out of options and are now thinking about homeschooling her.<p>